Anybody Coming Back?

Oops! Road Sign with Dramatic Blue Sky.Crappy choice,

Unfair word,

Heard or said.

Bad time,

Wrong place,

And you fall.

Happened before,

But it hurts more this time.

Now you’re back,

Sitting in the back of the room,

Hoping no one notices you,

And yet

You came on your own,

Knowing well it will help

To get back on your feet,

Fix the problem,

As you’ve learned

Or are ready to learn from the error.

You hear that call,

That is there every meeting,

That question that you hoped all this time

You didn’t have to answer.

Your knees tremble and your mouth is dry

As you’re about to reveal to the crowd

Of friends and strangers

That you are coming back from the war zone

Where your addiction and weakness rule.

You expect judgement and pointed fingers,

But what you get is a hug and a welcome

That you need the most.

It is here each time, whether it is the first time, or one hundredth,

As there is hope

That this is the last time

You’ve spilled nearly all of your blood on the way in.

the image was copied from http://hub.yourtakeonwords.com/hub/humanistring?w=1366;rh=http%3a%2f%2fhumanisthappiness%2eblogspot%2ecom%2f2013%2f06%2fwas-it-my-fault%2ehtml;rd=1#.W5MKIehKjIU thanks.

about dogs

d4b18c4eb8fc439969cdebd6e488781aMy Dad sent me something last week after he found it online. Below is my translation of it from Russian.

All rights belong to whoever wrote it. And thank you to them. It definitely taught me something about me and my dog.

The mother-in-law got sick. A week later she died. We took the father-in-law to live with us, thank goodness we got enough room. The mother-in-law had a dog, just a black hairy ugly thing. Took the dog as well, for our own misfortune. The dog chews on everything, bites my kids, being mouthy with me, craps everywhere. We take it for a walk out, but you have to have two people walking it. I contacted dog specialists, paid them to teach me what to do with the dog, how to care for it, – no use. They say it’s easier to just put it down. The father-in-law heard about that, he told us that if the dog dies, it’s him time to go too. So, we left it as it was. The kids go out in the summer wearing long sleeves and pants, hiding the scars from me, pitying the grandpa. By the Fall the dog went completely crazy: biting itself, howling. Turns out, besides everything it also needs to have its nails trimmed. We went to all the places where such service is provided, but nobody takes such angry dogs to service them. Finally, we were recommended one place.

I get the dog to the agency, drag it in. The dog fights back, like it’s possessed. Enters a young woman, tiniest I’ve seen. I tell her of the situation, promise her any money, maybe she could do an anaesthesia while she services the dog (in my mind praying that the dog dies under). The little lady takes the leash out of my hands and asks me to come back at a certain time. I come back as I was told and watch the lady cutting the hair between the toes of a beautiful dog that stands on the table, proud, still, rubber orange ball in its teeth. I just stare at that fine picture. Then the dog looked at me sideways and I recognized it: that was my dog! The lady tells me that she will show me how to brush the dog’s teeth and how to trim the nails. I almost lost it on her. I told he the whole story. She thought about it and said: “You need to understand the dog’s situation. You know that its owner died, but its doesn’t. In the dog’s reasoning, you’ve abducted it from its home in the absence of its owner, and now you keep it by force at your place against its will. It can sense that its other owner, the father-in-law, is upset too. So, since it can’t run away, it’s trying to do everything possible for you to kick it out. Try to talk to it, like a male to a male. Explain the situation. Comfort it.”

I put the dog in the car, took it straight to the old mother-in-law’s house. Opened it up, it’s empty there, smells like no life at all. Told the dog everything. The dog listened, didn’t believe me, but didn’t fight or offend me in any way. I took the dog to the cemetery, showed it the grave. That’s when the mother-in-law’s neighbor came over after visiting family’s graves. We opened a bottle of vodka, drank to their memory, offered some to the dog, had a chat. Suddenly the dog REALIZED IT. Raised its head to the air, and howled. Then it lay down by the grave, and stayed that way, head stuck under its paws. I didn’t rush anything. When the dog was ready, so was I. Together we went to my car.

My family didn’t recognize the dog. When I told them the story, they didn’t believe me. I told them what the little lady taught me, and what came out of it. My son didn’t listen to the end of it, grabbed his jacket and car keys, demands the lady’s address. “What for?” – “Dad, I will marry her!” – “You’re nuts! You didn’t even see her!” – “Dad, if she got into the dog’s situation, do you think she won’t understand me?”. Anyway, three months later they got married. Now I’ve got three grandkids growing up. And the dog? The dog is trustworthy, calm, behaves, listens, incredibly smart old dog, helps to look after the kids. And they brush its teeth at night.

image was copied from https://www.pinterest.com.au/pin/397090892115085574/ thanks.

Can’t Hear a Thing

cartoon7151Among things we as humans do, such as move, produce, preserve, and copulate, there is one more thing that we can do really well, and yet often fail at. It’s communicating.

Funny enough, in the world of today where communicating is recognized as vital, and with many different ways of communicating are invented, starting with education of languages and lectures on body language, and ending with phones, faxes, and whatever else they’ve invented lately that I’ve missed, we fail to communicate so much.

And that’s amazing, considering that we communicate all the time. When I write this, you read it, so I’ve communicated to you what I think and feel, and whether you agreed or disagreed with it, you can’t help but receive the information that I’ve shared. When you stand in front of me and talk, I hear you, but I also read your face expressing how you feel about what you’re saying, and I can also pay attention to your hands and the rest of your body reacting to what is being said or what you really thought. We share that information and most of us are inherently good at it.

And yet, so often we communicate and not pay attention to what was communicated to us. So often we listen, but we don’t hear. And so often we don’t even try to listen, just pass by, thinking something else is important. I am guilty of that. I can be so lost in thoughts that I am lost for words when they need to be said. Whether it is to say that I agree, or to say I’m sorry, or to provide an insight, often I just seem to think there are more important things to pay attention to right at that moment, and I ignore others. Or sometimes I am so lost in my thoughts that I miss or misinterpret what’s being said and make wrong judgements of it and come to negative and upsetting conclusions.

I read a story by Chuck Palaniuk, the author of Fight Club, where he wrote that you only get people’s attention when you disclose that you are diagnosed with or dying from some incurable disease. That’s when people start really paying attention to what you’re saying and how you are feeling.

It is at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting that we really listen to others. We hear their stories, we think about how it relates to us, we express empathy with our nods and smiles, and after the meeting we talk, we discuss, and often go somewhere to talk about it some more. It is a system that works well for decades. It is not unique though, because people do that on a regular basis. People talk, people solve problems by discussing it. Only in AA meeting we discuss something that, if left unspoken, may literally destroy person’s life. That’s why we make sure we give a word to a newcomer, even if they don’t feel like talking in front of strangers.

The fact that this fellowship exists is a great thing. Over a decade ago it saved my life, just like for the last 80 years it was saving lives of thousands. But I can’t help but wonder if there could be less reasons for AA’s existence if we, the humans in general, could originally communicate better.

What if we could talk without being hurtful so that we wouldn’t cause people to look for a potentially dangerous outlet, such as drugs and alcohol? What if we didn’t produce so much alcohol that we needed to advertise it so rampantly? Remember, advertising is communication too, just as a movie you watched, or a book you read, only TV or Internet ads provide short ideas faster and with a shock value that successfully affects your mental faculties, promising you desires to be fulfilled. A powerful language to present ideas, and dangerous at that.

Could we advertise more ideas of hope and kindness than what to buy, where, for how much, and where it is less expensive and move convenient? Would we improve our lives with more products… or with more hope and understanding that we should care for others? So often I realize that it is not what we say to others, but how we say it that has more lasting effect, negative and positive.

Unfortunately, I don’t know if these questions can be answered. Thus, I focus on what’s at hand and stay sober and go to my AA home group meetings. Communication is power, and AA is based on communication. Without, it AA won’t work. We speak, we listen, we share, we read recovery books, and when we pray, it is communication to, isn’t it?

So now that we are afflicted, since the failures of communication already happened to plague us, let’s try to connect better. Maybe let’s do a better effort to listen to those that need to speak, with our loved ones (especially with them, because we may think we had a perfect connection, but we’re so often take it for granted), with our friends, with strangers, on a bus, on a street, in a group, even if we have no time, or desire to do so. Somebody’s life and sanity may depend on it.

I guess, I have to start with myself. Writing this is only the first step of dealing with it.

image copied from https://www.andertoons.com/speaking/cartoon/7151/know-youre-new-but-its-hear-ye-hear-ye-not-listen-up-people thanks.

Ripple Effect

ripple-960x490A person I know was taking a 34 years birthday cake at the AA meeting I go to often. I always loved it how he managed to put great examples out to make point, and how well he talked so that everyone understood what he was trying to say, leaving no room for scratching heads due to misunderstanding, unless we really needed to ponder something.

He said that for our actions that are ripple effects, just like when a drop of rain water falls in a lake, making waves. The harder it falls, the more intense the reaction of the ripples. And each time we do something bad, somebody would get affected by it negatively, although we may not see it. And each time we do something positive, someone will catch that too, somehow.

Now, he said, when we, the suffering alcoholics/addicts, come to recovery and live healthy, and just be there, sharing our recovery by living the principles of recovery, the effect will be made on others. We may not see it or know it, but the effect will be massive. For each one “saved” person, living recovery, there will be ten people positively affected by it.

I hear it often in the meetings that we are miracles. So many people out there don’t make it back healthy, or alive. They somehow give up on recovery, on the truth, they get tired of making an effort, or they were misled, or they couldn’t find something they really needed, or they had no helping hand, and they got lost. Those of us that got found and came to the right places to get our lives and sanity back, those are very fortunate ones. We are immensely lucky to get it together. And with us benefitting from recovery, by listening to others, sharing our stories, living the life of conscious sobriety, many people we know, and many that we don’t know can have a good life.

Why? Us addicts, we walk with fire and tornado by our sides. We mess up our families, friends, work places, strangers. We make police, and paramedics, and psychologists work harder. There are more hospital beds open for the injured when alcoholics walk out or don’t arrive in the first place. There are less issues in the world when we get out crap together and stop causing trouble. I caused trouble because I was hurt, but I rarely could see the aftermath of my hurt and insanity. All these are meaningful points to keep in mind. Remembering that makes more reasons for me to stay sober and clean today.

the image was copied from https://ignitepotential.com/2011/11/positive-ripple-effect/ thanks.

Happiness is Homemade

5b5bf765c0d79cbdd8ed0aee8046f029I read this on Wednesday at a place where I came for a job interview. Wrote it down. Had the interview. Two days later found I didn’t get a job, but that I came pretty close with getting it. That was a positive thought. And maybe it’s a good thing I didn’t get the job. I did a lot of thinking regarding it. And today I found that line. And it makes a lot of sense today.

So how is happiness homemade?

I read earlier today, browsing WordPress, that you cannot make others happy if you are not happy yourself. I expressed an opinion that well, you can, but not for long, because your being unhappy, even if you had skills to make others happy, will eventually catch up with you, and what you do, and who you are with. And then the blade will fall for them too.

That’s why I think happiness is not out there, somewhere in a mythical place, and we need to go through fog and fire, and over tall mountains to obtain it. We find happiness within ourselves. Even if we think our happiness is in others, I think it is our reaction to them that makes us happy. I may be with two people I sort of know, but they may be lovers, and I would never know what is it that he sees in her, while they mean a world to each other.

So, the happiness is something that we make for ourselves, and then we can share it with others. If I feel like crap this week, my girlfriend is still happy being with me, and me – with her, and I can feed on that to get better, even though I didn’t have it in me for a while. But if I am unhappy with myself overall, I will be looking for something positive, something magical, something to make me content, and I won’t find it until I look inside of me and try to create it, looking into what I am, what I’m trying to be, trying to achieve, trying to fix, and making steps toward making it a reality, coming close to that with every day if I believe it is important. Then, and only then, I think, I will be able to be serene with who I am and the world around me.

the image was copied from https://www.pinterest.ca/pin/550213279444757863/ thanks.

Trapped Under Bed

22-under-bedOne of my AA group members was celebrating birthday the other day and he mentioned something regarding finding spirituality. He always opposed it, proudly considering himself an atheist.

And then he came to AA. And he still resisted spirituality. And he suffered because of that, knowing he should have given himself a break, yet he kept pushing it away for that’s what he did all his life. The struggle of inviting the spirituality in his life and resisting it at the same time was all consuming and affecting all the areas of his life. The metaphor he used for that time was being trapped under the bed. He wasn’t in his bed from where he could see so much in comfort, but instead he was under. Not only he was stuck in there as the bed pressed on him, he also didn’t have a very good vision of what was in front of him. He was trying to look out and see much more of the room, and out of the room – the house, and out of the house – to see the world around it, and yet he wasn’t allowing himself to do so. Once he realized that’s what was happening to him, the desire to push forward multiplied. And he… well, he crawled out in to the world, so to speak.

I cannot fully sign under these words. I was lucky to have discovered spirituality in high school, and although maybe not fully, I understood what it was and how it was making my life fuller. I was a loner, I believed in things I couldn’t see. I wrote stories about things others laughed at. I listened to music many people around me didn’t understand. Pagan rites of my native country were not something that a lot of people cared at the sunset of the 20th century. But to me it was the world rediscovered, and there was a spirit of wonderful kind, and its inhabitants danced, and they taught me things – of how we used to be, how we were simple and open, and how we could be so much better.

Still, many doors were closed to discover the Spirit and wisdom of simpler things, because I was influenced so much by the utilitarian world. Mythology of the Norse and ancient Greek, not what it stood for then, in old times, but what it taught, what it warned about, – these things were not something that concerned the world that worshipped money and technology. Information, selling it, expanding it, all of it was the major focus. And I opposed it so much that I started closing the doors on all of the real world. I started refusing to accept the life on its terms. It caused me a lot of grief. Alcohol became the permanent solution to that problem. Or so I thought.

Luckily, one day I woke up. By that time, I did a lot of damage to my mental health, so restoring the balance took years. But my beliefs in the spirit world, the wisdom, the care for simpler things, that didn’t get affected. The spiritual understanding of the world only got stronger, I think, because when I did wake up, the spirit within me stood stronger than before. The heart was thirsty for knowing things that rang true. The ears were open to hear the stories of others that taught so much. The eyes refused to shut, for there was much to see, right in front of me, and all around. The room, the house, and the outside, as much as it stretched.

the image was copied from https://film-grab.com/2010/09/29/millers-crossing/22-under-bed/ thank you.